


Maze of Horrors

by ABrighterDarkness



Series: Tony Stark Bingo [4]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Blood and Injury, Caves, Child Abuse, Childhood Memories, Drowning, Eventual Happy Ending, Heavy Angst, Howard Stark's A+ Parenting, Howard Stark's Bad Parenting, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Memories, Mystery Character(s), Past Torture, Psychological Torture, Psychological Trauma, Sharing Body Heat, Steve Rogers Feels, Steve Rogers Needs a Hug, Temporary Character Death, Tony Stark Feels, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Trapped
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-25
Updated: 2020-03-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 18:47:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22890490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ABrighterDarkness/pseuds/ABrighterDarkness
Summary: Whoever this was, if their goal was to break them, they were doing a pretty damned good job at it.They still hadn’t found the exit and Tony felt like their time was beginning to run out. Time for what, exactly, he had no idea but his skin was crawling with the realization.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Series: Tony Stark Bingo [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1599133
Comments: 19
Kudos: 189
Collections: Tony Stark Bingo 2020





	1. Labyrinth

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Tony Stark Bingo square S2 "Labyrinth", Card 3089
> 
> Be sure to keep an eye on the tags for this one as it does hit on some touchy topics. If you feel that I've missed any (I tried to put everything I could think of but I'm admittedly human and may have missed some) please feel free to let me know in the comments.
> 
> There will be another two chapters to this (there will be resolution, eventually). They will also be TSB squares and will probably be up in the next week or so, depending on how nicely they continue to play in the writing stages.
> 
> A _huge_ thank you to starksnack for beta-ing this one for me. 
> 
> Feel free to let me know what you think!

Tony woke slowly, feeling incredibly groggy with a headache from hell. And cold. Why the hell was he so damned cold. The lack of familiar sourness on his tongue meant that the headache wasn’t a hangover but it sure felt like one. Tony scowled in annoyed confusion when something repetitively tapped sharply at his face but his arms were heavy when he attempted to swat at the irritant. 

“Tony,” a low, echoing voice called. And the face-tapping thing again, damnit. “Tony, wake up. Come on, Tony.”

“Knock it off, Rogers,” Tony groaned, finally gaining enough control over his limbs to shove the offending hand away from his face. “J’ turn up the heat, would ya.”

“Oh thank God,” Steve breathed, words oddly shaky and uneven.

Tony’s confusion deepened at the relief in the man’s voice. He forced his eyes open and blinked, eyes adjusting to the limited lighting. “Why are you in my room?”

“I’m not,” Steve replied, shifting from his kneeling crouch over Tony to sit on the ground. The ground? Wait. “I’m not sure where we are but I’m pretty sure it’s not the tower.”

A low groan worked its way out of him as Tony pushed himself upright and looked around. There was no denying that they were no longer in the tower. Rather than the floor to ceiling windows that he had become accustomed to, there was nothing but stone above, below, and in three sides around them. Tony felt his stomach turn at the very cave-like imagery.

“Where the hell are we?” He asked, ignoring his body’s shivering and slowly climbing to his feet. Whoever took them could have at least had the courtesy to dress them in something a little warmer than their respective sleepwear. At least they’d both gone to bed wearing pants. That could have been awkward.

“Dunno,” Steve frowned as he stood as well. “I only woke up a few minutes before you came around.”

Tony eyed the cave entrance warily, “Sitting here isn’t helping.”

“No,” Steve agreed. “I’ll admit I’ve had enough of going to sleep in one place and waking up in an unfamiliar location.”

“Oh,” Tony winced and turned to look over the other man. He was paler than usual with an odd glint in his eyes that Tony would almost classify as fear. But his jaw was set in a familiar manner that told Tony that Steve Rogers was prepared to stubborn his way through whatever this was, and no matter how terrified he was, he wasn’t about to admit it. Tony hesitated for a moment to consider his approach. In the end, he opted to follow Steve’s lead and ignore the obvious fear for the time being. It wasn’t like he was feeling any different at the moment and Tony certainly wasn’t up to discuss it either. “We should see what we can find.”

“Yeah,” Steve nodded and then grimaced. “We’ll have to be careful. You don’t have the suit and the shield is still back home.”

As much as he wanted to, Tony didn’t allow himself to linger on how Steve referred to the tower as ‘home’. He could take a few moments when they were safe to preen ridiculously over the passing comment. Instead, he shrugged, “It’s not like you’re ever actually unarmed though, right? I’m not a slouch either.”

“True,” Steve conceded with a slight smile. It was a small thing but it seemed to diminish some of the fear so Tony counted it as a win. He still had to bite back an annoyed huff when Steve pushed ahead of him though. While, objectively, he knew that Steve was much more durable than he was without the suit, it still grated. 

The mouth of the cave was bright. Both men ducked their heads and squinted as their eyes adjusted to the sudden intensity. Steve clearly recovered first, Tony’s attention was jolted at a sharp exhale from behind him. Behind him? When had Steve moved behind him?

“There’s not gonna be a safe landing, but I can try and force it down,” Steve said in a low, quiet voice. His tone was off, as though reciting something from memory rather than speaking clearly. And then the same words, in a different--considerably more stressed and determined--tone echoed around him and Tony took in his surroundings fully. It registered then, what was happening, or at least what Tony thought was happening. Somehow, he was reliving Cap’s last moments before the ice. The recorded conversation that he had grown up listening to played on around him but more real. Strangely, he could feel the fear and determination, tinged heavily with regret, that Steve would likely have been feeling at that particular moment in time.

He was in the pilot’s chair of a plane, a very large one at that. The sun and clouds glared through the dozens of thick glass panels that made up the plane’s windshield. It was bright, so very bright, Tony’s eyes squinted automatically in response. The sun at the horizon and the tinting of the clouds in response would have made for a beautifully scenic view. Would have, that was, if not for the painfully sinking feeling in Tony’s chest at what he knew from Howard’s many, many notes was to come.

Steve had been heading west over the Atlantic, towards New York, Tony recalled. Tony was sure that there was some sort of twisted, ironic, metaphysical bullshit there somewhere about the plane crashing into the ocean as the sun set. 

“Tony,” Steve called from behind him, voice as frightened as Tony had ever heard it. “Tony, we’ve gotta move. I don’t--”

“How?” Tony asked, unable to even turn away from what was happening, just as the control under his hands jerked forward and the plane began its nosedive towards the ocean. His heart was racing and he automatically attempted to yank the controls back, to correct to a safer course. 

They didn’t budge.

“I don’t--I don’t know. Whatever this is, I can’t  _ move _ ,” Steve said and then fell ghostly silent where he stood. Tony could barely even hear him breathe. The slight, pained hitch in his breathing just a moment later had Tony’s eyes clenched shut as they listened to the conversation between Steve and Peggy Carter from days long past echo around them.

It was widely believed among historians that Steve’s ‘death’ had to have been instantaneous. That the speed and force of the aircraft impacting the water would have caused enough damage, with enough force, that chances of surviving that initial blow would have been microscopic. Steve wouldn’t have been able to feel much beyond the initial jolt of pain. He wouldn’t have been alive long enough to have suffered as he descended to what should have been an icy grave.

Steve had never said anything to the contrary. He never spoke of it at all, Tony realized.

If what Tony was feeling at that moment was in any way accurate, history had been wrong. Dead wrong. The sensation of the plane hitting the water was nothing like anything Tony could define. The pain from the bone-shattering impact was jarring and brutal enough to make one wish for a quick death. Had Tony been experiencing it from his own, baseline human body, there would have been no chance of him surviving it, perhaps even with the suit. But it didn’t seem like it was a wish that had been granted for Steve.

Tony stayed perfectly,  _ painfully, _ conscious as the pressure shattered the thick glass, the shards slicing through skin and muscle with ease-- _ “ _ Tony!  _ Tony!  _ Goddamnit, let me  _ go _ . You twisted sonofabitch, it's  _ killing him!” _ \--and icy water flooded the plane. He could hear every whine and creak of the overstressed metal as bolts gave and panels collapsed inwards. The rattled debris from inside of the plane causing as much damage as the crash itself as the impact tossed everything around inside the confined space, pinning Tony in place. His arms reached without prompting to cling to the shield as it washed past, holding onto it tightly as though it could offer some sense of security in the midst of a living nightmare. That hadn’t been his movements, Tony distantly realized. He could hear the rushing of the water finding new paths to take to lay claim to the wreckage. 

What was worse was that Tony could feel the unadulterated terror, Steve’s from then and his own currently, as the water overtook him. The crushing pain and the biting cold forcing him to breathe in gasps even as the water flooded his lungs. 

“Tony, no, stay with me. Don’t you dare let this sick fuck win.”

Holy shit, he could  _ feel his body shutting down. _ Was this--? Did Steve really remember all of this? Was history  _ that  _ wrong? Was  _ this _ what Steve saw,  _ felt, _ when he put that plane down? Did he experience this nightmare again and again when he dreamed?

Suddenly strong arms were around his torso, curling around him and pulling him tightly against an equally strong body and they were moving. He could hear a muffled, bitten back grunt of pain and a whispered  _ “I’m so sorry” _ that Tony didn’t know and couldn’t seek out the cause of. Not with his body still rebelling against everything he had just experienced. 

The air around him warmed marginally. Still cold but no longer the frigid, icy depths of the ocean. Steve lowered him onto the ground, one arm braced around Tony’s back, rubbing broad strokes up and down his spine as he shivered violently and coughed suddenly nonexistent water from his lungs. 

“I’m so sorry,” Steve repeated between shaky breaths. “I’m so sorry, Tony.”

“What the hell are you sorry for?” Tony sputtered, shaking his head and narrowing his eyes slightly up at Steve as he finally managed to catch his breath.

“No one needed to-to see that,” he said, eyes dropping to the ground beneath them. His face was ashen, taking on a sickly pallor and his jaw clenched and released anxiously.

“Was that...Was that  _ real, _ Steve?” Tony asked, hesitantly. “You remember--?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Steve said firmly, visibly pulling himself back together. Tony watched him swallow thickly while his hand continued the soothing strokes over Tony’s back. “Are you okay?”

“Of course it matters! How could--That was--That was terrifying and that was  _ real _ ,” Tony argued almost hysterically, unable to decide at that moment exactly what he was feeling. He wanted to rage, to continue to drive his point until Steve gave in and told him everything. That or finally told him that the horrifying nightmare that Tony had just lived through was  _ not  _ true. But the hand still stroking over his back was trembling, barely but still noticeable when he took the time to pay attention. Steve was probably just as, if not more, rattled by reliving those moments. Tony exhaled slowly, forcing down the bubbling hysteria. “Yeah, I think-I think I’m alright.” He took a breath, appreciating a lungful of air rather than icy water, and looked around. It wasn’t quite a continuation of the cave but it did bear unsettling resemblance to the underground tunnel network that the Ten Rings had utilized. “We need to figure out where we are and how to get the hell out of here.”

Steve nodded in agreement, seemingly relieved that Tony hadn’t pressed further. He would, he absofuckinglutely would when they got out of here. But now definitely wasn’t the time. “Can you stand?”

“Yeah,” Tony confirmed, bracing his hands against Steve’s forearms and pushing himself unsteadily to his feet. It was only then, when he was away from the warmth of Steve’s furnace-like body heat, that Tony realized his clothing was wet. Wet and cold enough to begin to grow stiff. There were stains of bright red blood on the fabric, places where Tony could still recall with crystal clarity shards of thick glass, razor-sharp steel, and falling supports catching and tearing against his body. The skin beneath the bloody patches was unmarked. 

Steve had risen beside him, offering support as long as he needed to steady himself, and frowned in concern when he followed Tony’s gaze. With shaky hands, Steve grasped Tony’s wrist and shoved the sleeve up to his elbow and examined the unmarred skin of his forearm. Given the nightmare that he had just relived, Tony now suspected that Steve had an eerily accurate memory of the damage that had been done to his body during the crash. “Any pain?” Steve asked hesitantly.

“No,” Tony shook his head. “Cold as fucking hell but no, there’s no pain.”

“Thank God,” Steve said with a relieved sigh. He tugged Tony’s shirt sleeve back into place but didn’t release his wrist, instead he used it to pull him in behind him as he cautiously moved forward into the tunnel network. “Stay close.”

“Keep your senses sharp,” Tony commented lowly while attempting to suppress the shivers the chilled tunnels and wet clothing caused. For once, he had no problems with following Steve’s directions, staying close meant staying at least somewhat warmer. Steve glanced over his shoulder questioningly and Tony shrugged. “Caves and tunnels like these, we could get lost easily. Sometimes they’re built like that intentionally. If we’re gonna find our way out of here, we’re going to need to rely on more than just luck.”

“Well, for now there’s only two options,” Steve pointed out and then his expression tightened. “And we’re sure as hell not going back the way we came.”

“Yeah, no, I definitely agree with that,” Tony grimaced. He had to shake his head to rid his ears of the echoes of shrieking metal and shattering glass.

They moved as silently as they could through the tunnel, Steve stopping them every so often to pull Tony into his side, offering what body heat he could. Tony knew that they couldn’t really afford to stay put for long but the cold had seeped bone deep. He wasn’t too proud to accept a bit of warmth when it was offered. Especially since it was Steve that was offering, not that Tony would admit that out loud.

The first time the tunnel forked ahead of them, Tony and Steve lingered at the split for several long moments. Steve attempted to stretch his senses, see if he could hear danger or possibly get a sense of airflow that might lead them outside. He shook his head and frowned, “I can’t get a read on either direction. At this rate we’ll be heading in blind no matter which we take.”

“We could split up?”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Tony,” Steve winced. “Not if...not if back there is what we have to look forward to. I don’t want to know what might have happened if I hadn’t been able to pull you out there at the end. We’re stronger if we stick together.”

Tony sighed but nodded in agreement. “Can’t say I want to be wandering alone in creepy underground caves anyway.”

In the end, they took the left fork.

Tony didn’t know how long they had been walking. His watch, of course, had been left at home alongside his usual day clothing and everything else that might have been of use. He had just begun to feel the fatigue sinking into his muscles when something changed, though he couldn’t place what. Something nudged at his memory, made the fine hairs on his body stand on end. 

“Tony,” Steve spoke quietly. “Something’s different up here. It’s the same sort of energy I remember from before we saw the plane.”

“So brace ourselves for another living nightmare?” Tony grimaced.

“Possibly,” Steve answered, matching Tony’s expression. 

Tony looked around again, taking in what little details were available to him. Up ahead, he could hear voices chattering in a multitude of languages and could see crates stacked along the walls of the caves. His stomach clenched and he swallowed thickly. “Cap…”

“Yeah,” Steve sighed with a nod, expression unreadably stoic. “Yeah, looks like this one might be for me.” Tony opened his mouth to say something, though he wasn’t sure what he could really say that might make this whole thing better but Steve’s hand tightened around his wrist ever so slightly. Steve offered a small, wry smile and shook his head, “I’ll be okay, Tony. Keep your eyes closed if you need to. No need for both of us to relive it.”

Tony shot him a dark glare at the suggestion. He was sure that Steve hadn’t closed his eyes for more than a blink while forced to relive his own terror, if Tony didn't know Steve as well as he did,he might have been a little bit insulted by the proffered kindness. He went to place a hand over the larger one wrapped around his wrist to argue the point when he was hit with an odd sense of disorientation. 

He stumbled slightly but instead of catching himself against Steve’s arm, Tony was struck entirely still. He wondered if that was the same force that Steve had been yelling at when Tony had been trapped in Steve’s dreamscape?...memory?...whatever the hell this was. If it was, he quickly understood the man’s helpless rage and hated himself a little bit for feeling lucky. 

As horrifying as the plane crash had been, Tony’s experience with it had been over in a matter of minutes. Whichever sick fuck decided on this method of torture seemed to want Steve to have the full three month experience of Tony’s capture crammed into as little time as possible. Tony had, at least, had a day or two of recovery time after his captors beat the shit out of him. 

Their current captors didn’t seem to care about something so insignificant as recovery time. 

Despite Steve’s encouragement to do so, Tony refused to close his eyes. Steve was suffering through  _ Tony’s _ nightmare, the least Tony could do was see him through it. He couldn’t help but wonder if it was the same for Steve. If Steve was able to feel Tony’s fear and resignation. The petrifying terror when he was shoved into dirty water with a battery attached to his chest. If, maybe, Steve picked up on the moment that Tony very nearly gave up hope while staring down the arsenal with his name printed clearly across the side. 

That hopelessness hadn’t left him though, even several years after he had managed to escape his capture and turn the whole mountain side into gravel. Tony could  _ still _ remember that horrifying sense of revelation. If he was entirely honest, he  _ clung  _ to that feeling, held onto it with every ounce of stubborn determination that he could muster. He refused to allow himself to forget that feeling, refused to allow himself to put it behind him. Because putting it behind him ran the risk of forgetting and forgetting meant the potential to repeat past mistakes. If ever he fell back into those mistakes, Tony genuinely believed that he would be deserving of every second of the torture he’d recieved and then some. 

From where he stood in this memory-dreamscape-thing, seeing the crates and the Stark Industries brand upon them...well, if not for Steve being forced to experience it, Tony might actually have been grateful for the reminder of why he was how he was. The refresher on what happened when Tony fell into the trap of intentional, blissful ignorance.

Tony tasted bile gathering on his tongue. Watching Steve’s head dunked in the filthy water overlayed with Tony’s new memory of icy water flooding his lungs caused his stomach to clench painfully. His mind drifted just enough to wonder what those three months might have actually been like had Steve actually been in that cave with him instead of still lost to the ice. He immediately berated his own mind. 

On one hand, it would have been a disaster that Tony wasn't entirely sure either of them would have survived. They were both far too headstrong and contrary by nature. Together, Tony wondered if those traits might have fed off of one another with explosive results. On the other hand, though, Tony might have been deserving of the wake up call, but it certainly wasn’t something that he would wish on Steve of all people.

It wasn’t until he watched Yinsen--oh god, Yinsen--run past him shooting the rifle haphazardly through the air, that Tony felt whatever force had been holding him still give way, releasing him from his current torment. He rushed through the tunnels that he would never, for the life of him, be able to forget to where he knew Steve would be. The same place he had been held.

“Steve, fuck, come on, we gotta go,” Tony urged as he rushed forward at the same time Steve grasped his upper arms and breathed out a shaky “Tony! Are you alright?”

“Me? Yeah, I’m good,” Tony said dismissively. “Let’s go. I’m about to blow the entire mountain to hell and I think we should be gone before then.”

When they pushed forward, they found themselves in another stretch of bare tunnel. The sounds of chaos, the lingering desert heat, ceased almost immediately and both men slumped against the chilled stone of the tunnel’s wall. Steve took a deep, shuddering breath before sliding down the wall to sit on the floor. Tony lasted just a few moments longer before he followed suit, crumpling into a seat beside Steve. 

“What d’you think this is?” Steve asked wearily after several long minutes of silence.

“If I had to guess, I’d say it’s gotta be some sort of magic or alien involvement,” Tony sighed, letting his head fall back against the wall, his mind automatically shifting to analyze the situation, gaining some small amount of comfort from the menial distraction. “Neither of our reports would give enough information for someone to get it  _ this right. _ I didn’t even include half of those details when I reported to Rhodney right after I was found.”

“Mine’s pretty public knowledge,” Steve shrugged.

“Not to that extent,” Tony denied immediately. “Maybe you forget but I was semi-raised by your number-one-biggest-fan. I’ve  _ read _ those reports, Steve. The basics, yeah, sure anyone could have grabbed those out of any history book you’re in. But...no one but you and I would know that you were fucking awake and remember the whole goddamned thing.”

“Not the whole thing, thankfully,” Steve countered with a shrug. 

Tony shuddered at the thought of Steve having remembered the entire duration of his time in the ice. What he  _ did _ remember was bad enough. Steve shifted beside him, eyeing him hesitantly, as though trying to find the words to ask something he didn’t really want to know. Tony caught the movement of Steve’s hand raising to rub against his sternum, visible now through the dirty, stained and torn remanence of what had started its life as a plain white t-shirt and Tony understood.

Without waiting for the words to be spoken, Tony raised his still-wet shirt until the blue glow of the arc reactor was visible. Steve eyed the device hesitantly for a long moment before his eyes shot up to meet Tony’s in question. Tony didn’t allow himself time to hesitate, he just responded with a small, albeit stiff, nod. Steve swallowed thickly and shifted, turning his body to fully face Tony. Tony could see a slight tremble in his hand when Steve’s fingertips touched lightly against the clear surface. 

Tony kept his eyes down, watching careful fingers brush over the arc reactor’s surface before diverting to trace around the long-healed edges where metal and skin met, ghosting lightly over the grotesque webbing of scar tissue. He forced down a shiver at the first sense of touch he could actually feel. His fingers were warm. Tony had half-expected coolness, if only because of the chilled environment. He wasn’t entirely sure  _ why _ he had expected it, considering that Steve had constantly been pulling Tony into his side in order to share superserum enhanced body heat. 

He intentionally did not think about how he was willingly allowing someone other than himself to touch the reactor. He didn’t linger at all on the fact that he had instinctively given Steve that sort of trust but he didn’t believe for a fraction of a second that the trust was misplaced.

Steve’s hand shifted and the broad palm rested over the entire reactor, fingers spread bracingly over his chest. Tony’s eyes widened in surprise and snapped up to meet Steve’s at the odd gesture. But Steve wasn’t looking at him. His head hung low but Tony could see his eyes clenched tightly closed and the painful looking pinching in his expression. He wondered, briefly, what sort of thoughts and feelings had run through the man’s mind while he was forced to experience Tony’s captivity. 

Tony didn’t speak, didn’t verbally interrupt whatever internal monologue going on in Steve’s mind. Instead, he lifted his own hand to cover Steve’s and shifted it just enough to the left that his hand was off of the reactor’s hard surface and pressed against flesh and steady heartbeat. He watched silently as Steve swallowed thickly again and slowly opened his eyes to meet Tony’s. 

Steve exhaled shakily and turned his hand to grip Tony’s in a tight---yet, as always, still gentle--squeeze. Tony clung to the contact until Steve withdrew, shifting to sit back against the wall once again pulling his knees in close to his chest and his hand falling limply into his lap. “Thinkin’ Loki?” He asked quietly, tilting his head back against the wall to stare at the curved ceiling. 

“Could be,” Tony shrugged, letting his shirt fall back into place. “I don’t know if there’s anyway to tell the source for sure if magic is involved somehow. At least not with the resources we have available at the moment.” 

”Yeah, ” Steve agreed quietly. “We should rest a bit and we’ll find our way out of here.” 

Tony tipped sideways to lean against his shoulder to indicate his agreement with the plan. Steve shifted, his arm moving around Tony to pull him in closer until their sides were pressed tightly against one another. Tony couldn’t help the sigh of relief at the warmth offered and automatically curled in closer, if that was even possible. 

Steve snorted a quiet laugh and shifted again, this time though to manhandle Tony until he was seated between Steve’s bent knees. Large arms wrapped around his torso and pulled him backwards until his back rested against Steve’s chest. Tony had been very aware of the fact that he had been cold since they had woken up in that first cave and the chill had only gotten worse following the sojourn with the Atlantic Ocean courtesy of Steve’s ice ladened memories. But he hadn’t realized just  _ how _ cold he had felt until just that moment when he was almost completely encompassed by warmth.

With a soft groan,Tony let his head fall back against Steve’s shoulder, even allowing himself a small smile when Steve’s arms tightened around him in response. Steve sighed quietly behind him and Tony felt the comforting weight of Steve’s head resting against his own. It was...nice, Tony realized. Despite the frankly terrifying situation they found themselves in, it was nice--wonderful, even--to have a stolen moment like this. 

He tried to imagine the same scenario with any one of their other teammates. Being cold and rattled and forced through their worst memories with Clint or Natasha or...He shuddered automatically at the thought and Steve’s arms tightened, pulling him in closer, warming him further. Tony released a quiet sigh. No. If Tony really had to experience this with one of the Avengers, Steve was the only one he could imagine trusting enough with the sources of his demons. The only one that he  _ did _ trust enough with it. He couldn’t help but hope that the same was true for Steve. 

Tony didn’t give himself time to question or second guess himself before sliding his hands down Steve’s arms to his hands and lacing their fingers together. Steve squeezed gently and Tony returned it. He could feel the slight movement against his temple and hoped it was at least something close to a smile. He took the comfort for what it was, though, and let his eyes close, taking advantage of a moment of rest before they continued picking their way through the Maze of Horrors.

It took quite a while for either of them to regain the motivation to move forward again, though the dim light in the caves and lack of timepiece made it difficult to know just how long. Finally though, Steve groaned, tightening his arms in a semblance of a hug and squeezing their linked hands gently before getting to his feet, using his hold to pull Tony along with him. “C’mon. Sooner we move the sooner we can get home.”

That didn’t seem to be what happened though. The tunnels seemed to begin to fork more frequently but Steve seemed to be unable to hear or otherwise sense anything each time the tunnel split. It was a guessing game that had them going in blind each and every time. After their previous experiences, each decision they were forced to make was daunting. After another left and then a right turn with nothing of note happening aside from more long stretches of bare tunnel, Steve paused mid-step and Tony felt the sickening sensation of being locked into place once again.

“I hear shouting,” Steve breathed.

Tony listened closely and had to wince, “If it’s what I think it is, you’re not gonna like this one, Cap. I’m sorry, in advance.”

“You’ve got nothing to be sorry for,” Steve said evenly, his jaw clenched slightly and Tony couldn’t help but wonder if he’d recognized the angry voice that was doing the shouting. Tony had. “Let’s get this over with.” Squaring his shoulders and taking a deep breath, Steve took a hesitant step forward.

Tony bit back a rush of anger. The previous memories had, at least to some extent, been public knowledge. While it was still painful to have Steve witness and live through what Tony had experienced in Afghanistan, this was different. This one was  _ personal _ and whoever was playing this sick game had  _ no right _ . No right to expose this. He gave himself just a brief moment to close his eyes and breathe deep, preparing him to watch Steve-fucking-Rogers live through one of his dear old dad’s shining moments. 

Howard Stark’s method of parenting usually meant negligence with a double shot of near constant, heavy handed criticism. All while playing the role of proud-parent in front of friends and the cameras. There were, however, a dozen or so times that Tony could recall that went beyond that. Way beyond that. If he was correct, Steve was about to witness the worst of it.

Howard had been drunk, but that hadn’t been anything new. Howard was  _ always _ drunk or drinking with the intent of getting there. Earlier that evening, he had donned the persona of proud father, talking and boasting Tony’s accomplishments. If Tony recalled correctly, it was his recent acceptance into MIT that had earned Howards indirect praise. Tony bit back a scoff, it was  _ always _ indirect praise. Howard had been pathologically allergic to praising Tony directly.

When they had gotten back home, Howard had beckoned Tony into his study. Tony remembered that he had still been naive and hopeful enough to believe that the invitation had been given because he’d done well. Because maybe  _ this time _ he had done something to have earned Howard’s praise, he’d gotten into MIT on his own merit at  _ fourteen _ for Christ’s sake.

But no, he had proven his own foolishness when, as soon as Tony latched the study door behind him, Howard began to rage at him.  _ Worthless. Foolish. Selfish. Useless sonofabitch. An embarrassment. Shame to the Stark name _ . If Tony had heard those words once, then he’d heard them a dozen times. Repetition had never taken the sting away though. But Tony also remembered that it was the first time that  _ Tony _ had also raged back. 

From where he remained trapped, Tony could see the tightly coiled anger in Steve’s posture as he glared at his old friend, unable to do much more than scowl hatefully. Perhaps it was a spiteful thought but Tony couldn’t help but feel vindicated by Steve’s anger on his behalf. 

The memory played on and the scene itself devolved into angry shouting. Right up until the first rough shove back against the solid wood of the door had knocked the words right out of Tony’s mouth as his head knocked back against the it and a decanter shattering against the far wall. Tony had gone silent then, the fight knocked out of him even as Howard had continued to rage. He didn’t have to watch the scene unfold to remember being yanked off of where he’d crumpled to the lush carpet, automatically curling protectively around the radiating pain in his arm--doctor’s later said oblique fractures of the left ulna and radius and complete dislocation of shoulder joint of the same arm--or to remember the soured whiskey smell of Howard’s breath in his face. 

The physical pain aside, Tony could clearly recall the overwhelming sense of failure when Howard had finally stumbled his way out of the study without a backward glance at his son. That was the night that Tony had finally come to the realization that he was  _ never _ going to be good enough. Especially considering his injuries had been played off as his own fault, as the result of one of his own failed experiments, not something that Howard had inflicted on him. In hindsight, Tony knew that that particular event was pivotal in defining Tony’s adolescent years and even into adulthood up until the Ten Rings got ahold of him and provided a brutal wake up call.

The door slamming behind Howard’s drunken stumbles must have been the signal whoever this was had been waiting for because Tony immediately felt himself released and able to move again. He cautiously moved towards where Steve was pushing himself off of the floor and extended a hand to help him up. 

Steve sat silently on the floor, staring at Tony’s hand for a long moment before accepting it and hauling himself to his feet. Rather than letting go, Steve used the hold to tug Tony forward and, to Tony’s surprise, hugged him tightly. Tony swallowed thickly but returned the embrace, allowing himself a moment to accept the comfort offered and to offer it in return. He could feel the radiating tension in the man’s muscles and could almost sense the anger that he was ruthlessly suppressing. 

“Hey,” Tony said lowly, tilting his head to speak more directly in his ear, his hands running soothing strokes up and down his back. “It was a long time ago. I’m good.”

“I swear, Tony, that if he wasn’t already dead--” 

“But he is, it’s done, can’t take it back,” Tony dismissed firmly, his hands stilling in order to tighten his arms around the man. “I’m alright, Steve.” 

Steve’s hands circled around Tony’s upper arms and pushed him away with noticeably careful movements. Tony could see his jaw clench tightly enough to cause concern for his molars. Suddenly Steve spun, face flushed and pulled into an angry snarl, his fist colliding with the tunnel wall with all his serum-enhanced strength behind the hit. “God _ damnit _ , Howard.”

Tony couldn’t help the automatic flinch and Steve went still. For a long moment, neither man seemed to even breathe. Steve moved first, running his hands over his face before letting them drop to his side. “I’m sorry, Tony.”

“I don’t accept,” Tony responded immediately, noting idly that neither the wall nor Steve’s hand had taken damage from the hit. What  _ was _ this place? “Because that was Howard, not you. If you keep apologizing every fucking time we come out of one of those nightmares, I might attempt to strangle you. And believe me, I'm annoyed enough to have a chance at succeeding.”

Steve huffed a small laugh of weary amusement and nodded in understanding. He slid down the wall and dropped his head forward against his bent knees and sighed. “I’m starting to worry about what else these assholes have in store for us,” Steve admitted.

“Yeah,” Tony agreed, with a miserable laugh. “Yeah, me too.”

The tunnels continued to stretch and branch out in front of them with no sense of coming to an end. They stumbled into four more memories, each as emotionally trying and painful as the last. Tony played a reluctant participant in a particularly costly operation with the Howling Commandos. Tony had, or course, read the files on the Hydra missions but experiencing it was something else entirely. He wasn’t sure there would have been anyway to adequately prepare himself for the sheer amount of pain Steve Rogers forced himself through when he felt it necessary. Just because he knew the serum would allow him to take hits that others wouldn’t likely survive. He wondered how the man had gotten so good at hiding it from them all. Not just the pain but the perpetual fear and bone-deep devastation. It was no wonder Steve always seemed to be so distant.

He also got a crash course into SHIELD’s definition of reintegration after Steve was recovered from the ice. That had been...well ‘enlightening’ was a good word for it. ‘Infuriating’ might be another. 

Tony didn’t think he would ever be able to forget the overwhelming sense of grief and horror that accompanied the fall of James Barnes.

By the time he was able to be pulled out of those dreamscapes, Tony was nauseous and thoroughly wrung out.

Steve got to experience Obie’s betrayal. That had been fun.

Steve hadn’t managed to meet Tony's eye since they had escaped from the train’s dreamscape. The guilt radiating off of him was nearly palpable, though Tony couldn't place the reason for the guilt. He would find out though. Once they were safe.

Whenever that happened to be.

They were both worn, Tony could see it in the way Steve slumped against the wall following each dream. The way his hands curled into tight fists that locked his whole arm stiffly and the increasingly lost look that had begun to inch towards defeat. And, thankfully, in the way he tugged Tony firmly back against him and buried his face into the curve of Tony’s shoulder whenever they slumped carelessly to the floor for just a couple of moments of stolen peace.

Whoever this was, if their goal was to break them, they were doing a pretty damned good job at it.

They still hadn’t found the exit and Tony felt like their time was beginning to run out. Time for what, exactly, he had no idea but his skin was crawling with the realization.

Tony curled back further into Steve's hold and forced his mind to quiet, if only for those few moments. 


	2. Phobia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “How long?” he asked despite really not wanting to know the answer. 
> 
> How long had he lost this time? How many times was this going to be his reality? How many times would he be forced to see the evidence of those he loved moving on and living their lives while he was left in the dust again? How many years was he destined to lose before he was allowed to live in some semblance of peace? 
> 
> When Tony spoke there was an unusual hesitance to his tone and the words were quiet and carried a similar pain to what Steve felt rushing through his mind and body. “Fourteen years,” he answered. He cleared his throat and gave a slight self-depreciative smile before continuing, “Fourteen years, two months, and seventeen days, if you want the whole of it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony Stark Bingo Card #3089  
> Square Filled: A-5 Phobia
> 
> Once again, keep an eye on the tags. This is another chapter that is fairly unfriendly to the guys. The third and final part of this is nearly finished and is going through final touch ups so I'm hoping to have it up early this next week.

When Steve awoke it was with an overwhelming sense of confusion. 

The chilled feel of the caves and tunnels clung to him but had replaced with an uncomfortably soft warmth. The memories, both his and Tony’s, that he had been forced to relive haunted him even as he forced his eyes open. When had he fallen asleep? He hadn’t even felt tired. Wrung out and emotionally drained but his body hadn’t felt like it had burnt through enough energy to allow for sleep. The ceiling above him wasn’t the jagged stone of the caves or one from his apartment at the tower that he had grown accustomed to and had begun to think of as home. Tony would never allow the flimsy inlaid tile and cheap lighting fixtures in his building even if Steve had requested it. 

Steve frowned and slowly looked around, coming to the realization that he was in a hospital of some sort. Now that he was paying attention, he could hear the obnoxious beeping from the various monitors that he seemed to be attached to. He could feel the slightly pinched pressure of the IV in his left arm. They had been found, then? That was--that was good. But something continued to nudge at the back of his mind; that instinctive feeling that something wasn’t quite right, putting him instantly on edge. His frown deepened when his eyes landed on the figure in the chair at his bedside. 

Tony. 

But--?

“Hey Cap,” Tony said quietly, leaning forward in his chair, his voice hesitant and tinged with something heavy. 

“Tony,” He breathed the name shakily, unable to reconcile what his eyes were telling him. 

Steve felt fear and devastation begin to clog his throat and his heart clenched painfully as the sinking realization began to dawn. He looked over the man slowly, taking in the hair that was suddenly far more grey than rich brown, the heavier creases in his still-handsome face. The cut and style of his clothing was different but still typical Tony in its elegance. Steve’s eyes caught on the gold band around Tony’s finger. And, oh, that shouldn’t have been as painful as it was to see. He clenched his eyes closed against the visual confirmation of his fears and slumped back against the bed, fighting the rising sense of dread that threatened to drown him as surely as the icy water had years before. 

“How long?” he asked despite really not wanting to know the answer. 

How long had he lost this time? How many times was this going to be his reality? How many times would he be forced to see the evidence of those he loved moving on and living their lives while he was left in the dust again? How many years was he destined to lose before he was allowed to live in some semblance of peace? 

When Tony spoke there was an unusual hesitance to his tone and the words were quiet and carried a similar pain to what Steve felt rushing through his mind and body. “Fourteen years,” he answered. He cleared his throat and gave a slight self-depreciative smile before continuing, “Fourteen years, two months, and seventeen days, if you want the whole of it.” 

“Fourteen…” Steve inhaled slowly and exhaled heavily in an attempt to stave off the rising panic. Fourteen years. Better than seventy, he supposed. Tony was still here. Still remembered him on all days instead of just the rare good ones. And he was happy, that’s everything Steve could want for him, right? Fourteen years wasn’t that bad right? 

It didn’t seem to be helping. The room spun around him despite the fact that he lay flat on his back in the hospital bed and his chest felt tight. A warm, familiar hand closed around his wrist, the coolness of the slim metal band feeling more damning than anything else at that moment. A sharp, painful exhale forced its way out of him and Steve fought to regain control of his breathing.

Just as suddenly, the panic gave way to almost complete, crippling numbness. He didn’t even bother trying to stop the few tears that had managed to escape that he could feel streaking down his temple and into his hair. He didn’t have the energy in the face of the revelation. Who wouldn’t shed a tear or two in this same situation?

“What happened?” he managed to ask tonelessly after a long moment. Tony was silent so long that Steve began to wonder if he was going to bother answering. 

The hand on his wrist twitched and Tony sighed, “Steve, what’s the last thing you remember?”

“The caves,” Steve answered in a subdued tone. “The memories.”

“The team found us,” Tony began in the same painfully quiet voice. “It turns out that we were right about magic being involved. Wrong about Loki, but right about magic. On the jet on the way back to New York, you -- you just collapsed. From everything we’ve been able to find out, it looks like it was a serum-induced coma intended as a protective measure. Protective measure for what? I still can’t tell you. We tried everything to get you back, Steve. You gotta believe me. But it was us against the serum that we  _ still _ don’t completely understand.” 

Tony paused again and Steve forced his eyes open once more, rolling his head against the thin pillow of the hospital bed to face him. Tony’s expression was twisted with grief. Steve wanted to reach out, but couldn’t move under the weight of the conversation. Tony swallowed thickly and drew a deep breath before speaking again. “You finally began responding to external stimuli last week. We hoped that meant you would be coming back to us soon but there was no way to know. I...I knew I had to be here when you finally pulled through. I didn’t want you to wake up alone.”

Steve stared blankly up at the ceiling and let it all run through his mind; trying to make sense of what happened. His mind insisted that it wasn’t true -- that there was something _ wrong, wrong, wrong. _ This wasn’t right. There was no way he should have gone from those goddamned caves to fourteen years in the future. The ice, at least, made sense on some level. Preservation. Hibernation. Whatever. There was  _ logic  _ somewhere in there. This  _ didn’t make sense. _

And yet…

“Shoulda jus’ let me go,” Steve muttered tonelessly.

“Let you go? Steve, what--?”

“I can’t  _ do this again,  _ Tony,” Steve groaned, numbness giving way to anger. “I can’t! I can’t lose more time! I hadn’t even had the chance to gain my feet from the  _ last time. _ I can’t. Tony...”

“Hey, hey,” Tony was suddenly sitting on the hospital bed, next to his hip. “Easy, Cap. This isn’t like the last time. The team? We’re still all here. We can help you get resettled. You know we will. We’ve all been waiting for you to come back to us.”

“You don’t…” Steve shook his head in irritation. “You don’t  _ get it,  _ Tony. Volunteering for this serum has taken  _ everything  _ from me. I can’t do this again.” Steve frowned and forced himself to sit upright; unable to lie down with Tony hovering over him. Some part of Steve’s brain wondered if it would have been easier if Tony hadn’t aged so very well. Steve pointedly ignored that train of thought. He was surprised when his body moved easily without a hint of stiffness or muscle deterioration. The memory of punching the cave wall without damaging the wall or his hand leapt forward into his mind. “This...this isn’t real, is it?”

Tony stared at him in palpable concern, possibly for his fracturing sanity, “I’m afraid it’s very real, Steve. I know I can be an asshole, but this isn’t something I would joke about.”

“No, no it’s not. It can’t be,” Steve argued. “You say I’ve been bedridden for over a decade, right? But look? I’m fine. No one’s physically fine after that long.”

“It’s the  _ serum _ , Steve. The serum maintained your body as long as we ensured that you were still getting adequate nutrition,” Tony explained slowly, concern heavy in his tone, his face growing more pained, presumably at having to be the one who confirmed that this nightmare was reality. “I wish it weren’t. I really wish I was sitting here days after we got out of those damned caves and telling you an entirely different story with so much to look forward to.” He winced and Steve saw his thumb automatically start fiddling with the ring on the same hand. “But I’m not. I’m sorry, Steve. I really, really am.”

“Show me,” Steve demanded. Prove it, his mind insisted. 

“I’ll bring a couple papers with me the next time I come in,” Tony promised. “But right now, we need to keep you calm. I know that’s a tall order, all things considered, but you’ve gotta try. You’ve just woken up and the docs’ll kick me out of here if I go getting you worked up right off the bat.”

Steve stared at him for a moment, Tony’s eyes bordered on pitying. That alone was enough to convince Steve that it wasn’t some sort of fabricated ruse. Aside from the the first handful of meetings, during which things were tense bordering on hostile between them, Tony had never  _ pitied  _ him and Steve had returned that for Tony. Pity hadn’t been something that either of them offered the other. And after the memories...no, Tony wouldn’t pity him.

He narrowed his eyes and determinedly swung his legs off of the hospital bed, yanking the IV from his arm--it would heal in moments, he knew--and forced himself to his feet. Steve had no problems with balance or coordination and his steps were steady and precise. His body felt just as it had every day since he stepped out of the VitaRay decades ago.

Fourteen years in a coma, his ass. 

He pointedly ignored Tony’s panicked voice, calling out and demanding that he stop, that he calm down and get back into the bed. He carefully brushed off the familiar hands that reached for him--false or not, that was still Tony and angry or not, he didn’t want to hurt the man--and strode to the door. He hesitated for just a brief moment before wrapping his fingers around the knob and twisting. Throwing the door open, Steve wasted no time pushing through the door into the rest of the hospital, prepared to demand information from the first doctor he could find. 

Steve frowned and looked around only to find himself standing in the middle of a very familiar tunnel. The chill washed over his skin and he risked a glance down to find himself in the same battered, shredded, and stained night clothes that he had started the ordeal in. Realization hit him, slamming into him all at once. It wasn’t real. 

_ It wasn’t real _ .

He stumbled backwards until his back collided with the hard stone wall and he slumped to the floor. Lost in a combination of fear, devastation, and crushing relief, Steve let his head fall forward against his arms, crossed over on top of his knees, and finally released the body-shaking sobs that he had been fighting down every since Tony had told him, down to the day, how long he had lost. He couldn’t remember the last time he allowed himself to cry like that. Probably just after Bucky fell. Steve was sure he wouldn’t have been able to stop this one no matter how hard he tried.

Suddenly he was being jostled and he slowly lifted his head from his arms and attempted to swipe away the wetness. Tony. Of course it was Tony. He gave Steve a small, shaky, understanding glance, eyes wide and as panicked as Steve felt and face drawn and pale, as he pushed into what had become his normal place between Steve’s bent knees. Though instead of tucking in back to front as had become habit, Tony tucked his own knees in the gap between Steve’s hips and feet, his arms wrapping around Steve’s waist and his head resting on Steve’s chest. 

It was strangely intimate in comparison to the previous position. Initially, it had been about providing Tony warmth so that he wouldn’t freeze to death in these caves. Wrapping around him, Steve’s chest to Tony’s back had just been practical, if nothing else. Then, after experiencing remembered nightmare after remembered nightmare, it became grounding. A brief moment of contact, a comforting embrace that helped soothe the lingering terror. This was different. This was essentially proper cuddling. 

Steve couldn’t bring himself to care. 

He wrapped his arms tightly around the other man, hugging him to his chest, exhaling heavily and shakily into the embrace as the last of his tears worked their way out. They sat like that in silence until Steve managed to get a handle on his emotions once again. Tony shifted against him, tilting his head back to look up at Steve, a hand--his left one, missing one particular piece of jewelry--raised to gently wipe away the wet tracks from Steve’s cheeks. 

“Wanna tell me what that was about?” Tony tried. Steve hesitated for a moment, taking in the sight of the man curled against him. Face unmarred by the additional decade of time, the rich dark hair without a hint of grey that his fingers always seemed to itch with the need to touch. Damp, stained, and battered sleep pants and t-shirt were worlds away from the elegant suit from his trip to the future.

“I - uhm,” he swallowed thickly and cleared his throat. “I’d woken up missing time again. After this, the caves and everything. You said it was a serum-induced coma.”

“How long?” Tony asked quietly.

“Fourteen years, two months, and seventeen days,” Steve repeated. Tony swore under his breath and tightened his hold slightly. “What happened? Last I remember we were going down one of the tunnels and we heard something and then I woke up in a hospital bed with you telling me I’d lost another decade and a half.”

Tony exhaled shakily, burrowing his head more firmly against Steve’s chest. “I - I’m not sure, actually. We were walking and you mentioned being able to hear something ahead and then I felt that thing again. That feeling. Not the stuck-still one but the one we kept getting when walking into one of those memory-nightmare things? That one. I turned to ask you about it and you were just...gone.”

One of Steve’s hands stroked gently up and down his side. “What did they make you see, Tony?” Steve asked quietly.

“I walked into a battle against my own tech,” Tony answered, voice low and tight. “Again. We all did. We - uh - we didn’t win. I-uh-I ” He paused and cleared his throat before continuing on steadier than he had the few words before. “I created something. It was supposed to be a good thing and then it was a really  _ bad  _ thing. A lot of people died. The team, too. You died hating me for it. And considering what I built, what I did, I think I kinda deserve it.”

“No, you don’t,” Steve disagreed resting his chin on top of Tony’s head, his arms tightening around him. He honestly couldn’t begin to decide which fate was worse: doomed to relive the worst of his memories, or trapped experiencing his biggest fears. “They’ve changed their methods.”

“Seems so,” Tony muttered in agreement against his chest. “Can we...just stay? For a little bit?”

The question was asked so hesitantly and guarded that it tugged at Steve’s overly battered heart and he nodded against Tony’s head. 

“Yeah,” he said softly. “Yeah, for a little bit.” 

Truth was, Steve wasn’t in much of a hurry to see what else was in store for them either. Sitting with Tony, curled around one another like they were, was grounding. It proved to his terrified mind that the last horrifying vision  _ wasn’t true. _ That he hadn’t lost it all again. They needed to get out of here, wherever here happened to be. But...for the moment, this was good too.

“You were married,” he said thoughtfully. Tony stiffened slightly, and Steve could feel the surprised tension. “In whatever that was, you wore a ring.”

“That should’ve told you it wasn’t real from the start,” Tony said with a self-depreciating huff of laughter. 

“Why do you say that?” Steve asked curiously.

“If you haven’t already noticed, I’m not really the marrying type, Cap,” Tony smirked.

Steve shrugged slightly, careful not to dislodge Tony as his fingers idly traced over the ridges of his ribs. “Fourteen years is a long time,” he said. “A lot can change in fourteen years.”

“Someone deciding that they’re willing to put up with Tony Stark for the rest of their lives isn’t one of those things,” he dismissed. 

Steve bit back the urge to argue the point. There was, hopefully, plenty of time for that later. Instead, he curled more tightly into Tony’s hold, hugging him firmly against his chest. They were silent again for several long moments before Steve frowned thoughtfully. “It’s strange.”

“What’s strange? Other than this entire fucked up experience?” Tony asked, not bothering to lift his head.

“I’m not sure how to explain it but,” his frown deepened slightly as he fought to find the words to explain what was going through his mind. “Before, they had us hitting worst memories, right?”

“Sure as hell seemed that way,” Tony agreed.

“And now it’s biggest fears,” Steve added.

“And swinging two-for-two on that.”

“Not...Not exactly,” Steve disagreed. “The fears, yes. But there are plenty worse memories I have than what SHIELD did. And why haven’t they utilized anything pre-serum or even the raid on Azzano? Hell, I almost died every other winter and probably shouldn’t’ve walked out of some of those alley’s back in the 30’s.”

“Maybe not terrifying enough?” Tony suggested.

Steve hummed thoughtfully and shook his head slowly. “I could be overthinking it but it seems like a...like a thing?”

“A thing?” Tony echoed, tone disbelieving. “I don’t know, Cap…”

“Just -- just hear me out, alright?” Steve said, his words coming faster as the pieces started falling into place. “Think about it. Remember you said that you knew at least something about all of those memories from Howard, right? The missions with the Commandos, losing Bucky, the plane crash. Hell, I’m sure SHIELD has documentation of my waking somewhere. Even if not all of the small details, you still knew most of it. Same as your time in Afghanistan and Stane’s part in it were at least mentioned in SHIELD’s files on you.”

“And the one with Howard?” Tony prompted.

“SHIELD is a spy agency, right? Is it really so hard to believe that Howard’s inclinations would have completely avoided notice?” Steve countered. “Pegs was far from stupid and I know back during the war she had notes on  _ everything.  _ I feel like that’s not something she would miss from her co-founder.”

“So you’re suggesting that this is SHIELD’s doing,” Tony stated, his expression darkening even as his eyes took on the distant quality that they generally did when he was chasing down a problem to find a solution. “But how? As far as I was able to tell, they don’t have access to this sort of technology. Not only that, but notes are one thing. How were they able to get the details that we’ve never shared with anyone?”

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted with a sigh. “And I’m not even saying that it’s SHIELD specifically. Maybe someone who’s got or managed to get access somehow?”

“Sonofabitch,” Tony muttered, turning his head until his forehead was pressed against Steve’s sternum. “What do you wanna bet that we don’t get out of here until we figure that out?”

“That’s another thing,” Steve said suddenly. “Did you notice that only our clothes are taking damage? How? How is that possible? We haven’t slept. We haven’t eaten or had access to water. I don’t know about you, but my exhaustion is purely mental and emotional. I’m wide awake.”

Tony was silent for a long moment, his fingers tapping consideringly where they rested against Steve’s back. Steve stayed quiet for a moment, letting him work out whatever theories were whirling away in that brilliant mind. 

“This -- this isn’t real, is it?” Tony said suddenly.

Steve felt chill wash over him at the repetition of the words he’d said insistently during that last...nightmare? Was that what it was? He frowned and shook his head. “What do you mean?”

“It makes an eerie amount of sense,” Tony said slowly. “All those things you pointed out. No damage, no true tiredness despite walking through these damned caves for what has to have been hours, at least.”

“What are you thinking?”

“I think this is all in our heads somehow,” Tony answered, his voice both hesitant and certain at the same time as though he was considering an option that he really didn’t want to be true but genuinely believed was. Slowly, he pulled away from their embrace to sit up, but didn’t bother moving from where he sat between Steve’s legs, wrapping his arms comfortably around Steve’s bent knees. He met Steve’s gaze with a serious expression. “A shared dream or reality or something along those lines. We’re talking magic or very, very sophisticated technology here. I can think of -- one or two possibilities, but those don’t take into account the type of tech Asgard, or other’s like that have access to. If I had to bet, I’d say that our actual bodies are sleeping soundly somewhere. Probably still safe and sound in our own beds at the tower.”

“So you’re saying that we’re  _ dreaming  _ this?” Steve repeated. “Shouldn’t we have woken up by now?”

Tony shrugged, “Not necessarily. I mean, there’s always the possibility that time passes differently here. Like, say we’ve been here for days. With the way sleep and dream cycles work, this could be happening in a regular night’s sleep. Or, there could be some sort of outside influence keeping us under. Medical intervention and sedation could keep us under for extended periods. Or whatever the alien form of those things would be called.”

Steve tilted his head in thought, considering the information gathered. “How would they get both of us in the same dreamscape then?”

“I--” Tony sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I have no idea, Cap. It makes me doubt that SHIELD is directly involved. They’re smart, but their tech isn’t this advanced. There’s rumors that this sort of tech exists currently but that’s all it is, rumors.”

“Apparently not,” Steve pointed out.

“Here’s a thought,” Tony frowned. “What do you remember about before we woke up here?”

“Not much of anything,” Steve admitted. “Woke up feeling almost hungover. Like I’d gotten ahold of some of that stuff Thor likes to bring us.”

“No missions that could have brought us into contact with...whatever this is?” Tony prompted.

“I feel like that’s a trick question,” Steve smirked. “I don’t remember, honestly.”

“Yet we both have eidetic memories,” Tony pointed out. “Another indication that this is somehow happening in our heads rather than to our actual selves.”

“So we’re essentially stuck here until the others figure out that something’s wrong and find a way to wake us up?” Steve asked. How much time was he going to lose to this? But then...he studied Tony for a moment and then relaxed back against the cave wall. It really wasn’t the same as losing time, was it? Not when he was still living all this. It was terrible, yes, but it wasn’t all bad. “Think we’ll remember this when we do?”

“I’m not sure,” Tony admitted. “I hope so. It’s been...not great. Really awful for a lot of it but…”

“Least we’re not in it alone?” Steve offered.

“Yeah,” Tony agreed with a small smile. “At least we’re not that.”

“Think they’d let us get away with just staying here and waiting it out?” Steve asked after a beat of silence.

“As much as I like that idea,” Tony started.

“Yeah, probably not, huh?” Steve smirked in resignation. “D’you think someone’s actually...you know, watching this whole thing?”

“I was trying really hard  _ not _ to think about that, actually, so thank you for that,” Tony groaned, tipping forward until his head rested against Steve’s chest again. “It’s one thing for you to see all of this. I don’t like the idea of someone seeing what they’re using against me.”

“Is that something that’s possible, do you think?”

“Until now I wouldn’t have thought  _ this _ was possible,” Tony shrugged. “At this point we might just expect the worst case scenario.”

“Which would be what?” Steve asked.

“We’ve been captured and are being monitored by some unknown enemy that isn’t of Earth origin. And the team has no idea that we’re gone, and said unknown enemy can see, hear, and understand everything that we can,” Tony rattled off immediately.

“That would be pretty bad, yes,” Steve agreed, blinking in surprise before frowning again. “Why us though?”

Tony shrugged dismissively. “I’d imagine the whole ‘Nuke through the Portal into Outerspace’ thing might have something to do with it.”

“No, I mean, why  _ us? _ Why did you and I get hit for this?” Steve questioned. “I mean, granted I’d rather it be you here with me than just about anyone else, but I don’t understand  _ why _ . Wouldn’t it be better for a potential enemy to have us go through all of this separately?”

“Really? You and Itsy Bitsy have gotten awfully close,” Tony pointed out, clearly catching and clinging onto the first part of Steve’s statement rather than the latter part with a wide-eyed astonishment lacing his words. “And you’d rather me here?”

“Of course,” Steve said, puzzled by the surprise in Tony’s voice. “If anyone’s going to see the worst of me, I can’t really think of anyone else I’d rather have with me. I trust you with my demons. Don’t get me wrong, I like and trust Natasha but...it--it’s different with you, you know?”

“I--oh,” Tony managed, voice oddly shaky, though Steve wasn’t sure that he could place why. “I - um.Same, Cap, Same. For the record though, the ‘worst of you’ is dealing with a whole lot of bullshit shoveled on your shoulders because you signed up for a science experiment. I haven’t seen anything that’s actually on you, Cap.”

“Not much different for you from where I’m standing,” Steve shrugged. “Yes, you relied on willful ignorance, but you were manipulated into that from the get go. And you fight tooth and nail every day to try and make up for it. I’ve seen that first hand.”

“Don’t start with that ‘it wasn’t your fault’ shit,” Tony warned. “I neglected my responsibilities, that was my doing. What happened during that time still falls on me.”

“True,” Steve conceded. “That doesn’t negate the changes you’ve made and the price you’ve paid since then, though. You’re a better man than you think you are.” Steve tilted his head and frowned thoughtfully, his hands pausing mid-stroke against Tony’s side as a thought snagged his attention. “See, and that’s what makes this stink of some sort of SHIELD plot. It’d be just like them to manipulate us into trusting each other more. For the team and all that.”

“Except the whole thing about not having this sort of tech,” Tony reminded him. “Besides, SHIELD would be more likely to put one or both of us in some sort of real danger and force us to work out whatever problems they thought we had. This is kinda extreme, even for them.”

“Think it’s related to the team though?” Steve frowned. “I mean...we’ve been doing alright...haven’t we? Before this, I mean?”

“I thought so,” Tony agreed. “So what, you help me not build tech that destroys everything, and I help you not lose more time? Is that the end goal?”

“I think we’d do that anyway, without this intervention,” said Steve.

“Too many questions without answers. I don’t like it,” Tony frowned, pressing firmly until he was flush against Steve once again, arms looping around his waist. Steve hugged him close at once, giving in and allowing his itchy fingers to scratch gently against Tony’s scalp and ducked his head unthinkingly, nosing affectionately into Tony’s hair.

“You still smell like your shampoo,” he commented idly. 

Tony snorted in amusement, but didn’t vocalize a protest, instead turning his head to bury his nose against Steve’s sternum. Steve felt himself flush when Tony drew in a deep breath through his nose and then tipped his head back to grin up at him. “And you still smell delicious,” he teased.

They both stilled for a moment and Steve swallowed thickly before speaking slowly but seriously. “When we get out of here, whether we remember everything or not, we’re gonna do something about this.”

“This as in--?” Tony hedged.

Steve almost didn’t answer, almost changed the topic. 

For all of the vulnerabilities that Tony had already witnessed, it felt like toeing a step too far. But then again, Tony already knew or could at least guess at nearly everything that Steve had ever thought to hide. He was sure that Tony knew this too but was equally reluctant to expose yet another vulnerability. “This as in whatever it is that’s been building, whatever this  _ thing _ is with us.”

Tony stared at him for a moment, that wide-eyed astonishment back on his expression. And then he smiled. Not one of the smirks or facade smiles but a true one that Steve hadn’t gotten to see very often. He ducked his head slightly with a quiet chuckle and nodded, “you got it, Steve.”

Silence fell between them and, despite their current circumstances, it was a comfortable silence. Steve still had no idea how they were going to get home or what else was in store for them. He really wished that he could think of anything other than that lingering dread. How much more were they expected to deal with? How many more terrors would they be forced to watch and live through?

His wandering thoughts were brought abruptly back to the present when Tony shivered sharply against him. Steve frowned and wrapped his arms tighter around him in an attempt to share warmth better but it was nearly impossible to pull Tony any closer than he already was. It was then that he felt the cold seeping in as well, though it seemed to be mostly localized at the lower half of his body.

When he glanced down, dread filled him when he realized that they were sitting in waist deep water. Frigid water, at that. “Tony,” he urged,

“Y-yeah,” Tony answered between chattering teeth. “Yeah, I see it. How did we not notice…?”

“Dreams, remember?” Steve replied. “C’mon. Gotta get up. It looks like it’s rising.”

With a muffled grunt, Steve managed to haul both of them to their feet. It was a small consolation, though, since it seemed as though the water had risen with them, lapping against his upper thighs. Steve forced down his rising panic and pulled Tony with him as he quickly moved further down the cave in hopes of escaping the flood.

He winced when he ran head first into a solid surface. It wasn’t the cave wall but some sort of invisible force field. Panic began to overwhelm even his stubborn determination and Steve turned and rushed to the opposite end only to find another invisible wall that kept them trapped in a narrow box with the water rising rapidly around them. 

Steve slammed his fist against the barrier with no effect. He huffed and took a few steps backwards before charging forward, ramming his shoulder with all of the serum-enhanced strength he could muster. When it didn’t work, he growled lowly in irritation and did it again. And again until Tony caught him by the arm and tugged.

“Steve,” Tony said. “Steve, stop. It’s...it’s not going to work, you know this.”

“I can’t, Tony,” Steve argued but he felt the sinking feeling of defeat as he stared over Tony’s shoulder and down the long, empty tunnel that they couldn’t access. When he dropped his arms back to his side he was forced to acknowledge that the water nearly reached his elbows. He exhaled shakily and reached out to pull Tony back to him. Tony went easily and tucked his shivering form tightly against him. Steve couldn’t be sure how much of the trembling was from the cold and how much of it was fear. He knew that Tony wasn’t the only one, though. 

He hated admitting defeat. He hated that giving up meant that he would inevitably have to watch Tony drown because the serum sure as hell wasn’t going to allow him to go first. When the water reached Steve’s shoulders and Tony had to strain to keep his head above water, Steve crouched slightly until he could gently grip Tony’s thighs and lifted him up. Tony gave a small sound of surprise but quickly wrapped his legs around Steve’s waist to help support his weight. Steve felt a small amount of relief that Tony’s head was held higher than his own after that.

He had to admit that he was relying on their captors’ previous behavior continuing. All of the other scenarios that they had been in had allowed them the ability to escape just as the situation might have killed them. Steve turned his head away from Tony to spit out the water that had gotten into his mouth as it lapped at his chin, using his legs to tread when the water swept the floor from under his feet and used the opportunity to see if the barriers had given way yet. 

They hadn’t.

Tony didn’t speak, he hadn’t said a word since he stopped Steve from running into the barrier the final time. For all his usual non stop babbling, the silence was as terrifying as the water. 

“Tony,” he said, trying to keep his own palpable fear out of his voice. “Tony, when--when we’re home. We talk.”

“When we’re home, Cap,” Tony managed but there was something flat and resigned in his tone that tore at his rapidly-beating heart. 

Icy water washed over his face and Steve fought the urge to cough against it, knowing even through the overwhelming panic that coughing would only allow more water into his lungs. He could feel Tony’s fingers digging painfully into his shoulders but he welcomed it, allowing the pain to keep him from spiraling entirely into fear-stricken panic at the pressure of the water surrounding him. Steve knew he could hold his breath for a very long time if he needed but only if he kept his wits about him.

There was a twitch of the fingers that pressed into his muscles that seized his heart because he  _ knew. _ He knew what that meant. His arms tightened as the legs around his waist loosened. 

Steve’s determination to keep a level head didn’t last long after that.

For the second time in his life, Steve felt icy water flooding into his lungs and his body beginning to shut down. This time, though, the only pain he felt originated beneath his sternum as he gripped Tony’s limp form as tightly against him as he could.


	3. Wake Up

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s okay,” Tony continued lowly, one hand cupping the back of Steve’s neck, thumb stroking over the base of his head when Steve shuddered into the embrace. “We’re okay. It’s only been three days. No time lost and I’m definitely not married.”
> 
> Steve gave a choked laugh but his hold tightened fractionally, “It’s over?”
> 
> “Seems like,” Tony answered. “I think we’re home safe and sound.” Steve slumped back against the bed in relief, pulling Tony down with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for Tony Stark Bingo card #3089  
> Square filled: T1, Wake Up!
> 
> We _finally_ get some resolution for Steve and Tony!
> 
> I hope that you've enjoyed the rough ride and that the ending somewhat makes up for the misery that they were dragged through.

Tony jolted awake in an instinctive panic, coughing violently against the water in his lungs. His head was spinning and ears ringing with a cacophony of sounds that slammed against the ache in his skull. There was pain and pressure in his chest and a hand flew up to press against where the arc reactor lay embedded in his chest. An overwhelming sense of relief washed through him when his fingers met the solid warmth of the device. It was only after several long minutes of painful coughing that he realized that he could breathe clearly. Almost as though he hadn’t just--

It came back to him, then. The terrifying and miserable stretch of time in the tunnels, the maze of horrors in he and Steve’s minds. The flooding tunnel blocked off by invisible walls that had left them no room for escape. No option but to hold on tightly and wait out the rising water. 

Steve. 

He became aware of scrambling bodies around him and multiple sets of hands on his body. Firm pressure on his shoulders of hands trying to urge him to lay back down. Tony shook his head blearily and tried to push the hands away from him and tried to bring his blurred vision back into focus. 

The first thing that he was able to notice was Pepper’s familiar small hand clinging to his left hand. And then he was able to recognize that the firm hold on his shoulder belonged to Clint on his right and Bruce on his left.

“Easy, Tony,” Bruce’s familiar voice urged.

“Steve,” he managed. “Where’s Steve?”

There was a heavy pause and then Bruce spoke again. “He’s just across the room, Tony. He’s not awake yet but Natasha’s keeping him company.”

Tony’s body moved instinctively, attempting to push his way off of the bed--in the tower’s medical floor, he thought--in order to get to the man in question as quickly as possible. Firm hands caught his shoulders again and pushed him back against the pillows. “No,” Tony bit out. “No, gotta wake ‘im. Can’t. Can’t lose more time.”

“Tony, we need you to be calm,” Pepper said soothingly, her small hand catching ahold of his again. “You need to let them check you over.”

“Cap’s alright,” Clint spoke confidently. “You woke up first but hopefully he won’t be far behind.”

Tony’s mind settled into something closer to normal and he allowed the situation to fully register. He sat up once again, shooting a dark scowl when Clint and Bruce attempted to push him back down, and ran his hands over his face. “What happened?” he demanded.

“Three days ago, JARVIS alerted me that you had collapsed in your lab a couple hours after we returned from the mission,” Bruce answered. “There were some irregularities in your biometrics and, most notably, we couldn’t bring you back around. It was roughly two hours later that we found Steve in the gym in the same state.”

“JARVIS didn’t alert you when Steve passed out?”

“Captain Rogers has requested that I not monitor his person unless a situation such as infiltration were to arise within the tower itself that would necessitate it,” JARVIS responded promptly.

“Of course he did,” Tony scoffed. “Okay, override that. Not-not with everything. But we need to know when someone loses consciousness sooner than  _ two hours.” _ Tony paused and frowned, “You said three days ago?”

Bruce nodded and glanced over his shoulder, presumably toward the bed that held Steve. “We tried the usual methods to pull someone back into consciousness but none were successful. We were actually just discussing calling in outside help when you woke up.”

“Yeah, I don’t think anything would’ve worked,” Tony said thoughtfully. 

“What makes you say that?” Clint asked but Tony shook his head dismissively.

“Do you remember anything?” Bruce questioned in a carefully neutral tone that caused Tony to narrow his eyes suspiciously.

“Not a thing,” he lied.

“Tony,” Bruce sighed. “We need to know what you know in order to get to the bottom of what happened.”

“Anything I know will have to wait until Cap’s with us,” Tony countered, his eyes narrowing further at the heavy glance Bruce exchanged with Pepper and Clint. “What? What aren’t you telling me?”

“Whatever was happening in that big brain of yours while you were out wasn’t...peaceful,” Clint grimaced. 

“We had to restrain Steve,” Bruce said bluntly. “For his and our safety.”

“Let me up,” Tony insisted, tugging at the blood pressure cuff around his arm.

“Tony, I really think you should--”

“Pep, I’m getting out of this damned bed with or without permission,” Tony interrupted firmly. “I’m going just across the room so you all can hover to your heart's content, but I’m going.” With that, Tony tugged and tore at the various monitoring attachments and swung his feet over the side of the bed, grateful to find that he was at least dressed in normal clothing rather than the awkward hospital-type gowns. 

He paused for a moment seated on the edge of the bed with his hands planted on either side of him, staring at the loose sweatpants that he could vaguely recall changing into after the Op...what was the Op? Why couldn’t he remember? His clothes were dry, he noted blankly. A shiver worked through him, recalling the cold, damp material clinging to him and chilling him to the bone until the icy waters took over.

“Tony?” Tony startled slightly when a hand rested against his shoulder and glanced up to see the concern on Bruce’s expression.

“Yeah, I’m good,” he said with a small smile that he was sure looked as forced as it felt. “I’m good, promise.” Tony pushed to his feet and was relieved that there was no muscle strain or weakness. It didn’t  _ feel _ like he’d spent days wandering through nightmares and underground tunnels. He had to admit that he had been concerned that there might be physical evidence of the whole situation. 

With slow but steady strides, Tony made his way across the medical bay until he reached the only other occupied bed. He offered a distracted nod in greeting to Natasha when she looked up at him speculatively. There was no hiding his distaste at seeing the way Steve’s arms and legs were restrained to the bed despite the fact that he looked to be doing little more than resting peacefully. Tony, of course, knew better.

“Take those off of him,” Tony insisted

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Natasha replied easily. “He was lashing out and it’s not safe for any of us to have an unaware supersoldier attempting to kill us in his sleep.”

“He won’t,” he said firmly, hoping that he was right and that whatever sick fuck that had chosen to play their sick games hadn’t released Tony but decided to keep Steve captive. “He won’t. Take them off.” Bruce hesitated for a long moment but eventually relented and carefully removed the restraints, leaving Steve’s limbs lying loosely on the bed. 

Tony couldn’t deny that his first inclination was to climb onto the bed with the man. To feel the heavy warmth wrapped around him again and, this time, have it actually be  _ real _ in the way the other times hadn’t been. But he couldn’t bring himself to make that move in front of a reluctant, hypervigilant audience. Steve had already witnessed the vast majority of Tony’s vulnerabilities and Tony couldn’t manage to let himself be anywhere near that exposed to the rest of the room. 

Instead, he settled for sitting on the bed beside Steve’s hip and taking one large hand between both of his own and holding tightly. Steve’s fingers twitched and then curled snuggly around Tony’s hand. It wasn’t enough but it would do for now. 

The room was silent. Tony could sense that the others wanted to say something. Wanted to ask questions that he wasn’t ready to answer. Wasn’t sure that he would  _ ever _ be ready to answer. Thankfully, they didn’t ask. Not  _ yet _ anyway.

Suddenly Steve lurched upright. His hand clamped down on Tony’s as violent coughs and gasping breaths shook his large body. Tony launched forward, the hand not claimed by Steve’s rising to rub over his back. “Easy,” he said lowly. “There’s no water. Deep breaths, Steve.”

“Tony,” Steve wheezed, his head snapped upwards, eyes wide and panicked as he swept over Tony’s body, like he had done after each and every one of those damned memories. Tony gave a small startled sound when Steve released his hand but immediately snagged strong arms around him and all but dragged Tony against him in a tight hug. Tony went easily, not bothering to even pretend to be unsettled by the contact, wrapping his own arms tightly around Steve’s broad shoulders.

“It’s okay,” Tony continued lowly, one hand cupping the back of Steve’s neck, thumb stroking over the base of his head when Steve shuddered into the embrace. “We’re okay. It’s only been three days. No time lost and I’m definitely not married.”

Steve gave a choked laugh but his hold tightened fractionally, “It’s over?”

“Seems like,” Tony answered. “I think we’re home safe and sound.” Steve slumped back against the bed in relief, pulling Tony down with him. 

“It wasn’t real,” Steve said blankly, though his tone sounded more like he was attempting to convince himself of the fact. “God, it wasn’t  _ real  _ but I-- _ Tony _ , I-I-I--”

An awkward throat clearing drew their attention and reminded Tony abruptly that they had company. He made to sit back up but Steve’s arms tensed and a faint, mildly panicked sound escaped against Tony’s temple. Tony let himself relax back into the hold and shifted just enough to be able to see the rest of the room and its occupants.

“Welcome back, Cap,” Clint greeted awkwardly. 

Natasha studied the pair intently for a moment before smirking slightly. “I feel like this is going to be an interesting debrief.”

“It was a shared dream, reality, what have you,” Tony said blandly. “Don’t know how it happened or how we got out but suffice to say that it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. Pretty sure that’s as in depth of details as you’re going to be getting, Little Red.”

“You know that’s not going to be enough,” she pointed out. 

“You’ll get enough to make the report but you won’t be getting details,” Steve replied firmly. “It’ll have to be enough.”

“Grab chairs or something, stop standing over us. It’s creepy,” Tony groused. “We might as well get this done with. J’, start recording.”

“Audio-visual recording has begun.”

“You first,” Tony insisted. “I want to know what the hell happened and what you’ve figured out.”

“You both collapsed at roughly the same time three days ago,” Natasha reported, tone and expression as neutral as expected. “We got you to medical. Bruce and JARVIS began scans in attempts to find a cause.”

“Brainwaves were normal albeit unpredictably scattered,” Bruce jumped in to add from where he sat on the corner of the bed by Steve’s feet. “The patterns were too different from what we would see had you been dreaming to classify it entirely as sleep. You were unconscious and unresponsive to external stimulation. Tapping your arm, pinches, pokes or even smelling salts. None of those managed to get a response. The only physical responses we would see coincided with increased brain activity that we thought might have been nightmares or a particularly rough mission. Your vitals confirmed that. Remaining at normal parameters but spiking several times throughout the last three days. I had JARVIS maintain a running log of all of it, if you want to look at it once everything’s calmed down.”

“I don’t think that’s necessary,” Tony dismissed. He had a pretty good idea what had caused the spikes and drops. He didn’t need the data points to confirm what he already knew. “But let’s jump forward a few steps, shall we? Did you find out what did this to us?”

“What do you remember about the last mission before all of this happened?” Natasha asked.

Tony and Steve exchanged a long, hesitant glance. Steve slowly shook his head almost imperceptibly and Tony grimaced. He turned his attention back to meet Natasha’s expectant look and shrugged, “Not a damned thing.”

“That’s peculiar,” Bruce said thoughtfully. “There was nothing to suggest that this should cause any sort of memory problems.”

Natasha settled back into her chair, legs curled against one arm of the chair while her back leaned against the opposite. “Someone was toying with Alien tech. Tony, you believed that it might have been AIM, Steve thought it might have been connected to HYDRA somehow. Turned out, you were both right. It was an off-shoot mash up of former operatives of both. Clint tried to warn you about the weapon--we still haven’t been able to figure out the exact purpose of it, I imagine you’ll want to take the lead on that when you’re back on your feet--but there wasn’t time. Steve took the first hit, stepping in front of you. As soon as he was down, you were hit.”

“What was odd though,” she said after a short pause. “Is that you were both helping each other back to your feet and back in the fight in under a minute. We thought that maybe it was something that was still in the experimental stages and therefore faulty.”

“And then we collapsed once we got back here,” Steve said thoughtfully. “Why the delayed effects?”

“I’m thinking that it has something to do with the differences between cortisol and adrenaline,” Bruce interjected. “I’m still working on trying to process it but from what I’ve been able to pick apart so far, adrenaline--like the increase you would inevitably see during a battle--seemed to hamper its functioning while  _ cortisol _ seemed to feed it.”

“So keeping us stressed, panicked and on edge for three days was actually the goal,” Tony frowned.

“Or some sort of preservation mechanism secondary to whatever the goal happened to be,” Natasha pointed out.

“You’re talking as though it's living,” Tony said, eyes narrowing as he glanced questioningly to Bruce.

“Not--Not  _ living, _ not by scientific definitions,” Bruce winced. “Whatever that weapon discharged coated you both with what looks do be millions of nanites that seem to operate like what you would think a hive-mind would. They, for lack of a better term,  _ fed _ on the rising cortisol levels in your body during whatever it was you experienced. During the few lulls where we saw oxytocin levels rise, the nanites went almost completely inactive though still somehow managed to maintain your unconscious states.”

“They’re gone now?” Steve asked, looking faintly ill at the thought.

“They began to simultaneously replicate and begin rapidly breaking down by the time we found them,” Bruce explained. “It’s just a guess, but I’m wondering if it was less a weapon and more a backup escape plan.”

“How do you figure?” Steve questioned, eyes narrowed curiously.

“Well, think about it,” Bruce shrugged. “They hit you with this thing and you were out of commission for three days. Both of you. The publicly acknowledged leaders of the Avengers. With you two down and no way of knowing when--or even  _ if _ \--we were going to be able to pull you back?”

“If that’s the case, it backfired,” Natasha pointed out and then shot a smirk in Steve and Tony’s direction. “When I wasn’t here playing babysitter I was using my contacts to find them. They’re in SHIELD custody awaiting interrogation whenever you’re ready.”

“Speaking of,” Steve cleared his throat and shifted uncomfortably. “Is there any indication that they were able to access anything that we saw?”

“None that I could tell,” Bruce frowned apologetically. “But nanites are Tony’s area.”

“I’ll take a look,” Tony nodded. “It shouldn’t be too difficult to see if there was any sort of transmission. I’d be interested to know how they managed to make it a shared scenario rather than us stuck in our own respective heads.”

“How long are we going to have to stay here?” Steve asked.

“Once we’re certain that the nanites have completely broken down and there won’t be any relapses, you should be able to go back to your normal lives,” Bruce answered. “Until then I’d like to keep you both under observation.”

“In the meantime,” Natasha interjected. “I’m heading back to SHIELD to see what more I can learn now that you’re both awake.” She gracefully rose from her chair and leaned forward to press a light kiss to each of their cheeks and then shot a pointed look in Clint’s direction. Clint huffed but bobbed a nod, waving haphazardly to the room and following her out of the bay.

Tony turned his attention back to Pepper who had been hovering silently behind Bruce. She met his gaze without hesitation and there was something soft and pleased in her expression. He could see her eyes shift away from his to observe the way that he was, even still, curled comfortably into Steve’s unrelenting hold. When she met his gaze again she offered a small, knowing smile that was still tinged with concern for the overall situation at hand.

“I should get back to work, too,” Pepper said evenly, her heels clicking against the floor as she strode forward, pressing a soft kiss to his cheek over the one Natasha had left. She ruffled his hair affectionately and squeezed Steve’s hand gently. “Keep me updated,” she instructed before giving another small parting smile and making toward the door. “Doctor Banner, would you care to join me for lunch?”

“What? Oh I-” Bruce winced noticeably, glancing at the men tangled on the hospital bed and then back to Pepper. “Ah-Right. Yes. Lunch sounds--sounds great Ms. Potts.” Another quick glance and Bruce nodded awkwardly before taking quick strides to catch up to where Pepper stood waiting by the doors. 

“They’re not very subtle, are they?” Steve commented with a small smirk betraying his amusement once the door closed firmly behind Bruce and Pepper.

“Not in the least,” Tony grinned. “I expected better from the Ginger Twins. Disappointing, I tell you.”

Steve chuckled softly, “Don’t let them hear you call them that.”

“I don’t have a death wish,” Tony scoffed. “And I know you and J’ won’t tell on me.”

“You seem awfully sure about that,” Steve quipped.

“Of course I am. You like me too much to resign me to death by high heeled shoes.”

“I feel like Nat would take offense to that statement,” Steve pointed out. “I think she’d find much more creative ways to kill you if she put her mind to it.”

“Ah, but we just established that you like me too much to rat me out, so I’m safe,” Tony grinned.

Steve smiled again but it was something tinged with pain. He lifted one hand and Tony stilled, watching his expression, as Steve brushed his fingertips over Tony’s cheek, swiping down over his jaw. The touch was so gentle and bordering on reverent that Tony had to force down a shiver. Steve’s voice, when he finally spoke again, was quiet and laced with the same pain that Tony had seen in his smile. “You’re okay?”

“Yeah,” Tony answered quietly. “Yeah, I’m alright. No lasting damage other than new nightmare fodder. You?”

“I don’t know,” Steve admitted with a shaky exhale. “I’m fine. Physically. But that last part...Tony…”

“I know,” Tony frowned. “That was...That was really fucked up.”

“I could tell,” Steve said, swallowing thickly before he was able to continue. “I could feel it when you were...gone. I-I lost it.”

“Hey,” Tony said firmly, shifting in Steve’s hold until their bodies were pressed as closely together as humanly possible, laying half-draped over him with an arm coiled around Steve’s waist. “I’m right here. It wasn’t real. We’re both safe now.”

Steve closed his eyes but nodded in understanding. Tony lifted his hand from Steve’s waist and carefully ran his fingers through Steve’s nightmare-mused hair, scratching lightly at his scalp. The fingers against Tony’s jaw twitched and Steve reopened his eyes to meet Tony’s. He stilled his movements, hesitating for just a moment, before tugging Steve’s head towards his own while he stretched up against him.

They kissed tentatively at first. Just a gentle press of lips until a small sound escaped Steve on a low sigh and the fingers against his jaw shifted back until his face was cradled in one large palm. Steve used the hold to carefully shift the angle before sinking fully into the kiss. 

Tony could very nearly taste all of the pain, fear, and relief that was tangled up into the single affection. But underneath all of that was a sweet tenderness that Tony could feel in the gentle palm against his jaw and the strong arm around his waist, holding him close. It wasn’t strictly a need for contact following the, frankly traumatizing, situation they had just escaped. It wasn’t a fear-driven need. At least not entirely. There was true want and affection there too.

_ “When we get out of here, whether we remember everything or not, we’re gonna do something about this. ‘This’ as in whatever it is that’s been building, whatever this thing is with us.” _

They certainly didn’t waste any time, did they? Not that Tony cared, he couldn’t help but smile into the kiss, it widening when he felt Steve smile in response. They would still need to talk about it at some point, he supposed. While kissing was nice, more than nice, he knew that it wouldn’t be enough. Not when Steve now knew him inside and out, better than pretty much anyone else in the world. And Tony suspected that the same was true for Steve with Tony. 

The maze of horrors, terrible as it had been, had broken something between them but Tony suspected that it was a good break. A healing break. Something that would allow them to rebuild better and stronger and, most importantly,  _ together. _

He liked the sound of that.

Tony had to pull back from the kiss far sooner than he would have liked when breathing became a pressing concern. Considering he had basically just drowned twice in the last three days--even if it had only happened in his head--he was not about to deprive himself of oxygen for too long if he could help it. He made to immediately dive back in for more but Steve’s hand tensed just enough to still his movements and Tony looked up at him questioningly.

“When they let us out of here, we’ll talk more? Maybe over dinner?” Steve asked, studying Tony’s reaction intently.

“Yeah, let’s do that,” Tony agreed as he tried to slow his breathing back to something closer to normal. “We’re really going to do something about it then?”

“I said we would, didn’t I?” Steve said, frowning slightly. “Unless--?”

“No, you did and I do,” Tony shrugged. “I just figured that it would be easy enough to let it slide as an ‘in the moment’ type comment and just let it go.”

“You might be right if it only started while we were in that place,” Steve pointed out. Tony knew that he had a point. It wasn’t a new thing. It was something that had seemingly always been there, just under the surface of every single one of their interactions over the past few years. Tony wasn’t even sure he could pinpoint exactly when it began or when he began to truly notice the change in the tension between them. But it definitely wasn’t a recent development. 

“But we both know that isn’t the case,” he continued, echoing Tony’s thoughts. “If anything it just highlighted that maybe we’ve been dragging our feet and waiting it out long enough. I don’t want to wait anymore.”

“Me either,” Tony agreed quietly as he settled back down onto the bed, his head coming to rest on Steve’s chest, his hand under his cheek and pressed flat against the firm muscle to feel the firm, steady beat of Steve’s heart against his palm and pulsing in his ear. Tony wasn’t sure how he could still feel so exhausted considering that they had essentially been doing nothing but sleeping for the better part of three days but as soon as he had settled comfortably over Steve, sleep began to tug on him. He jerked himself back sharply, blinking rapidly to attempt to rid the fatigue from his mind.

“Tony?” Steve questioned in concern.

Tony shivered slightly and shrugged, “Not really wanting to go back to sleep but I think my body’s got different ideas.”

“What if I stayed awake and kept watch?” Steve offered thoughtfully.

“Kept watch from here? For what?” Tony asked, expression crinkling in confusion.

“Just watch over you,” Steve shrugged. “Wake you if I notice dreams taking a bad turn.”

“That...That could work,” Tony agreed hesitantly.

“Come here,” he urged, gently tugging Tony back down onto him and into his hold. Tony settled back into his previous position and took a deep breath to try to dispel his anxieties. He startled when he first felt fingers in his hair and then sighed quietly at the pleasant sensation of the same fingers gently petting through and scratching lightly at his scalp. Between the warm hold, the gentle touch and the sound of Steve’s steady heartbeat, Tony drifted off almost immediately.

He awoke again, hours later, on his side with Steve curled protectively against his back, his head resting on one of Steve’s arm while the other wrapped snugly around his waist. Tony could feel Steve’s steady heartbeat against his back and his slow, even breath against the back of his neck as he slept on contently.

While the idea of AIM and HYDRA potentially teaming up was a terrifying concept, Tony couldn’t help but think that the whole thing had been worth it. Just to be able to wake up like this. Maybe the next time he woke up in Steve’s arms would be in the privacy of his own bedroom. That thought was enough to draw a smile as he sank back into Steve’s hold and let himself doze until they were required to be awake for more tests and scans.


End file.
